Originally written by Harley Carlson.
In the perpetual quest to become a mainstream mainstay, Century Media‘s continued signing of sub-standard acts like Agents Of Man, Blessed By A Broken Heart, and Manntis has significantly marred their underground credibility. As they’ve blatantly replaced quality with accessibility, a trait I hoped I’d never live to witness, the once unyielding label may have driven that proverbial final nail with the latest additions of Suicide Silence and In This Moment to their increasingly average roster. Today’s focus is directed towards the latter. Exceeding one million plays on their MySpace page as an unsigned band, it was a sure bet that as a female fronted metalcore outfit In This Moment’s popularity would only skyrocket with label support. Aware of the financial benefits of such an act, Century Media was fully prepared to exploit an ever growing trend within a trend and earn some prompt scratch in the process.
Along the same formulaic lines as All That Remains, Killswitch Engage, and Bullet For My Valentine, California’s In This Moment employ the usual clean to screamed vocals, upbeat melodic death riffing into acoustic interludes, and the occasional booming breakdown. Having a frontwoman rather than a frontman is the one singular characteristic that sets the Los Angeles based quintet apart from the above mentioned. The eleven tracks that make up their forty minute debut Beautiful Tragedy are far catchier than most of us would like to admit. Though I have minimal interest in music of this kind, songs like “Daddy’s Fallen Angel”, “This Moment”, and “Circles” are so infectious that I’ll probably find myself humming their melodies on my way to work months down the road. Despite being well written and performed, however, many of the numbers rely too heavily on tactics lifted right out of the playbooks of their contemporaries. With little in common with the likes of Walls Of Jericho or Light This City, Beautiful Tragedy is more or less a spinoff of Killswitch Engage’s highly acclaimed The End Of Heartache. Virtually every element is present on an album that is no more their own than it is yours or mine.
WIth regards to the metalcore scene, female fronted or otherwise, In This Moment have a certain degree of professionalism that the majority of acts playing this brand of metal do not. Beautiful Tragedy shamelessly shows the band’s influences on an album that isn’t completely unoriginal, but essentially overly inspired by those very same influences. In closing, In This Moment have a ways to go before they will hit their stride and fully see their own vision realized. In what is a fleeting fad, they’ll also need to rethink their approach if they’re going to gain my approval on they’re next release.
